A national phone survey found more than 44% of adult Internet users used the Internet to publish their thoughts, respond to others, post pictures and or share files. Yet only 2% of Adult Internet users have blogs while in 2004, between 2% and 7% of adult Internet users have created diaries or blogs. This survey showed 11% of Internet users have read the blogs or diaries of other Internet users and a third posted material to blogs.
July 31, 2006
Probably the Most Useful Real Estate Post Ever in Long Beach
Ever confused by those cryptic ads trying to figure out what they are saying? Look no more but here is a link to glossary of terms.
Just love it. Now I can’t pretend to not know anymore!
July 30, 2006
Cheesy Nationwide Newspaper Indulges in Sensationalism, Long Beach
A cheesy well-known nationwide newspaper that you only read when there is nothing else to read on airplane rides asked why real estate commissions stayed above 5% as home prices surged? Or why an agent of 20 years gets the same commission as a rookie? Or why the Internet, which has revolutionized other businesses, has had relatively little effect on real estate? My question is where have you been? Have you been hiding your head under the sand or are you just indulging in sensationalism, something you excel at these days knowing your newspaper won;t exist anymore in ten years due to poor reporting quality?
Some people want to do the foot work while others cannot or will not. Simple as that. Having a choice is the real question here, and I am for that. I am not defending NAR either but saying the industry is intent on keeping things the way they in an article that does not allow for comments is at best a cheap shot and clearly sends a clear message across, we report what we want, how we want and do not care you think about this.
Pay ridiculous amounts of money to buy a home? Why do some people buy Mercedes and go to a Mercedes dealership to maintain them? Because they see quality and value in it, maybe? Some people like to have professionals help them navigate through the thirty to fifty page contract pitfalls it takes to buy a home. Can everyone do it on their own? No, but some people can if they studied the laws, the market and have an on-site knowledge of the local market. Do you also tell your lawyers the same thing when they protect you from a tricky situation in court? Or you tax accountant when he helps you waddle through the IRS laws?
The real estate industry hasn’t been revolutionized by the Internet? When you say revolution, do you not mean evolution? If so, MLS’s are not an evolution? How so? What information are you looking at? Emailing lists, virtual tours, should I go on or have you not bothered to look into products companies offer? I agree that there are some unethical people in our profession, come to think of it, like any other profession, I am sure you would agree looking at the state of yours. In fact, I heartily offer myself as a study for you to see what goes on behind the scenes in real estate.
So here is a question I am dying to ask, if you pay $2000 for information on an article you are writing and someone comes along, wants little info, gets the gist of it for $500 and publishes it. Would are your thoughts when people will get seemingly the same coverage from it than yours? Should that person be able to access at a rebate the database you use and pay for at a premium, make money from the work and dollars spent other from full-fledged agents? In other words, should I open all my hard earned work to someone who is not willing to put in the same amount of work and money into it and make money off of my work? Why is this not fair? Like you, I am not in the business of giving all of my time and effort away. I also need to pay my bills and get compensated for my knowledge, my studying the state laws and learning the ropes of the business. Would you find it fair if someone had full access to your database at a discount price and publishes the same news? Again you are only looking at one side and yell out loud something you do not fully grasp.
Full-service brokers cannot see discount brokers as a threat if they have work ethics and really give the extra service discount brokers cannot. It’s as simple as that. Some people want full service, others do not. I pay for an MLS service that gives me other’s information that pay the same amount. I don’t pay full service so that a discount broker that puts back less than I do use my information to make money. I would not either.
Can you guess which newspaper it is?
No Post Today, Or Almost in Long Beach
About 41 years ago, give or take sidereal time, Nick was born in
sunny hot South of France. It was a great day, I think… Well after
that, I was brought home and got some well deserved rest 
which I
will enjoy again with my wonderful supporting wife Virginia a dady at the beach and
then off to see Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young!
July 29, 2006
Promising Outlooks For Long Beach, Carson And Signal Hill
According to sales tax receipts, Signal Hill City had a good first half of the year and expected a positive second half. Thanks to Home Depot and car dealerships reporting healthy numbers. The future looks promising also with the addition of Circuit City and Best Buys stores.
Even though the forecast looks rosy, the capital projects cost have skyrocketed and could slow expectations. High costs of oil for asphalt, the war in Iraq, the damage caused by Hurricane Katrina and China’s exponential growth, along with a slowing real estate market are unsettling confidence.
The City of Carson says it has not seen any noticeable decline. as the warehousing, goods movement and logistics industries in the Long Beach-Los Angeles port complex continue to drive the Carson economy. The new hydrogen facility to be built also helps even though they also are finding a slow down in the residential real estate markets.
With an estimated 2,000 new jobs in health care, logistic, hospitality and tourism sectors, Long Beach economy is looking good this coming year. According to the Long Beach Business Journal, our city’s four most promising sectors are its international trade, retail, health care and hospitality and tourism industries. The Boeing Company’s C-17 aircraft contract future is in talks at this moment.
You can read these stories in the Long Beach Business Journal.
Juggling Mortgage Payments With Refinancing, Long Beach
As adjustable-rate mortgages are starting to squeeze wallets, many people are refinancing with new lower adjustable-rate mortgages. However, this is taking a few steps back to better jump the gorge. The interest and rates will catch up soon or later. So this is a stop-gap solution.
We are starting to hear stories about homeowners buying to find a year later lenders encouraging them to refinance into larger loans to pay off credit-card debts, for instance. With appraisal values of homes going up until last year, it was a no-brainer. That is until now. These 2003 adjustable-rate loans are ballooning and refinancing into a fixed-rate loan is no easy task with home values dropping in some parts of the country.
What this could mean is that we will see over the next few years instead of the next few months more people having problems paying their mortgages. In other words, the flow of people that wanted to cash on the last good rates of a few months ago might help cushion the heartaches over a few years.
July 28, 2006
Someone is Phishing You in Long Beach
Have you been Phished? A phishing email tries to get you to reveal some of your personal information in order to access your accounts or even worse steal your identity. You have seen these emails, often claiming to be from eBay, PayPal, or some well known bank and ask you to verify some of your information.
As soon as this happens, you should log in to your real service and change you log-in information as well as notifying your service to check for any activity.
Basically, real Banks and other financial based institutions do not send you emails asking for personal information. Also remember tat a five minute phone call to your bank can save you a lot of stolen dollars, months of frustration and more. Never click on any links in the strange emails you get. If the institution needs verification of your identity call them.
Remember not to fill in forms contained in emails and if you do not have an account with the institution ignore the email.
You can report phishing email to the institution of your choice. Unfortunately, it won’t do anything much but it may make you feel better. and who knows, after a million people email to complain, our elected officials might seriously look into it. I don’t know if that’s a good thing or not.
If you think you have fallen for a phishing scam immediately contact your institution by phone and find out if anything suspicious has happened. Let them know you think you might be a victim and explain what happened.
This post used a lot of Dan Butler’s ideas and his excellent newsletter I highly recommend called TNPCNewsletter.com which can be accessed at this address. He also has written books and I have been reading his newsletter for a few years. I am always impressed with the level of accuracy and professionalism, plus he is a very nice guy.
More Real Estate Agents and Brokers, Long Beach
As I mentioned two days ago, California surpassed 500,000 new agents. Thats 55,000 agents and brokers than last year. With that many people we can easily predict many, many seminars on how to get rich quickly in real estate, many, many companies calling these new agents to pay desk fees for the priviledge of working and being mentored. We can also easily predict, many, many very entrepreneural people with exotic business models cropping all over the state to help these new agents make a name for themsleves.
What is really scary is what will all these people do in a deflating market where houses stay longer on the market. With a glut of agents and brokers, where will they find work? I read somewhere that there are one agent for every five families in California. Don’t quote me on that but it was an absurd number.
One good thing out of this is that it will bring competition and help agents remarket themselves.
July 27, 2006
Do You Know Wikipedia? Long Beach
Wiki is short for wiki wiki which means "fast" or "quick" in Hawaiian. So what? Wikipedia is the uber Utopian Internet tool per excellence. Wikipedia is an online encyclopedia where visitors can edit its content. The main articles are written by volunteers that allows most articles to be edited.
What a great idea. This is truly the closest thing to the original ideal of what the Internet was supposed to be, a place where information was freely available to everyone. A gigantic online encyclopedia that users can add to, change and if enough people concur, it changes.
More on Defining The Market, Long Beach
California Association of Realtors (CAR) is calling it a "Not ‘Soft Landing" stating they no longer feels comfortable with that mild label. Yikes, what is happening now.
A closer read into the article finds that for optimists "soft landing" is a notion that implied values would stay over all. The association reviewed its original 2006 sales prediction from a 2% slip to a 16.8% drop. Most professionals will not be surprised at this. Most of us have been seeing it very closely.
On a bizarre note, the state Department of Real Estate reported 500,000 agents in May bringing this new lofty heights to one agent for every 55 adults in the state. I’m telling you it will be a very interesting year full of surprises and readjustments.